Mayor Catherine E. Pugh and Interim Police Commissioner Gary Tuggle announced the launch of the gun buyback program at a news conference Tuesday at police headquarters. Pugh said the program is one strategy to try to reduce violence in the city… “We are coming towards the end of the year and we are doing everything we can to stay under a certain number, but I don’t want to even talk about that,” Pugh said, describing the buyback event as part of the city’s violence reduction initiatives. …Pugh did not say how much the buyback program would cost, but she believes the city has enough money for it. She said nonprofits would be contributing.

So why is this so funny? Shouldn’t I be upset that Baltimore politicians and bureaucrats want law-abiding people to give up guns, which will make life easier for criminals?

But there’s a very amusing part of this story. Baltimore is offering $25 for every “hi-capacity” magazine.

And this creates a very interesting opportunity to make a quick buck since a quick online search reveals that one popular magazine (holds 30 rounds, so easily qualifies) can be purchased for about $11-$13.

Before you buy a truckload of magazines in hopes of some easy cash, I must warn you that there is a slight obstacle. If the poster above is accurate, the buyback is only for residents of Baltimore.

That being said, it shouldn’t be too difficult to find a local guy to act as your “straw seller.”

P.S. Some of you might feel guilty about participating since taxpayer money will be squandered on the buyback. That’s a noble sentiment. However, the story in the Sun also noted that some of the financing would come from nonprofits. And that means participants will probably be helping to deplete the bank accounts of George Soros and Michael Bloomberg. More money for you and less money for them is a win-win situation.

P.P.S. To the best of my recollection, my only other example of gun-buyback humor is at the end of this column.

The reason the chart is so enjoyable is that it nicely captures Obama’s total failure to impose gun control. Heck, he didn’t just fail to change policy, he actually wound up being the best thing that ever happened to gun manufacturers. And I confess that makes me feel warm and fuzzy.

But let’s set that aside and actually take a closer look at gun ownership numbers. The data in the chart come from a global survey. Here’s some of the coverage of those numbers from the Associated Press.

The Small Arms Survey says 393 million of the civilian-held firearms, 46 percent, are in the United States, which is “more than those held by civilians in the other top 25 countries combined.” …the report’s author, Aaron Karp, said at a news conference. “American civilians buy an average of 14 million new firearms every year, and that means the United States is an overwhelming presence on civilian markets.” …The estimate of over 1 billion firearms worldwide at the end of 2017 also includes 133 million such weapons held by government military forces and 22.7 million by law enforcement agencies, it said. …The Small Arms Survey released its study to coincide with the third U.N. conference to assess progress on implementing a 2001 program known as Prevent, Combat and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms… According to the report, the countries with the largest estimated number of civilian-held legal and illegal firearms at the end of 2017 were the United States with 393.3 million, India with 71.1 million, China with 49.7 million, Pakistan with 43.9 million and Russia with 17.6 million. …Americans, who own 121 firearms for every 100 residents. They are followed by Yemenis at 53, Montenegro and Serbia with 39, Canada and Uruguay about 35, and Finland, Lebanon and Iceland around 32.

Given America’s status, I’m tempted to start chanting “USA, USA, USA,” but there are some very important factoids buried in the AP report.

Anna Alvazzi del Frate, the institute’s program director, said that “the countries with the highest level of firearm violence — they don’t rank high in terms of ownership per person.” “So what we see is that there is no direct correlation at the global level between firearm ownership and violence,” she said.

Wow, that’s a remarkable admission. It turns out that more guns don’t lead to more crime. But we already knew that.

There are more than 393 million civilian-owned firearms in the United States, or enough for every man, woman and child to own one and still have 67 million guns left over. Those numbers come from the latest edition of the global Small Arms Survey… The report, which draws on official data, survey data and other measures for 230 countries, finds that global firearm ownership is heavily concentrated in the United States. In 2017, for instance, Americans made up 4 percent of the world’s population but owned about 46 percent of the entire global stock of 857 million civilian firearms. …the United States stands out among the world’s wealthiest nations, with an ownership rate more than three times higher than the rate in the next-highest country, Canada. …Measured in rates or in raw terms, the United States is the civilian gun capital of the world.

Since I already shared the chart about the U.S. having more guns than people, here’s another chart from the story showing how Americans are far better armed than their counterparts in other advanced countries.

I’m surprised Switzerland isn’t in second place, but I’m glad to see good numbers from the Nordic nations (Bernie Sanders may have to reconsider his affection for those countries).

P.S. Thinking about whether to create a collection of “enjoyable charts,” the obvious choice would be the one from 2014 that showed how effectively the Tea Party-influenced GOP stymied Obama’s spending plans (that was back when Republicans were in favor of smaller government, unlike 2018).

P.P.S. The AP story mentioned that the United Nations has a pact to restrict private gun ownership. I explained in 2013 why that’s an awful scheme. The good news is that Trump’s new National Security Adviser is very solid on that issue.

Here are some excerpts from a column in the Des Moines Register written by a long-time supporter of gun control.

I was 14 years old when John Lennon was killed — it affected me deeply and it was the biggest event that led to my anti-gun feelings. As I got older, my heroes were JFK, RFK and MLK, which furthered my anti-gun sentiments. …I thought the Second Amendment was not relevant to our modern-day society and it should be repealed. …In 2012 I tweeted: “@BarackObama please repeal the 2nd amendment and stop the @nra.” …I was a lifelong Democrat. In the 2016 presidential debates I watched…Hillary Clinton… I voted for her. …I was a little turned off by…the NRA.

But he began to change his mind as the election was happening.

I decided to leave San Francisco and to build a house in Washington. …as my house was being built I started wondering what I would do in the event of a home invasion. I knew right away becoming a gun owner was going to be the best way to defend myself.

I gave it a lot of thought and decided I was going to purchase a gun and learn to shoot… I started going to the range and discovered that I really enjoyed target shooting.

His philosophical shift apparently wasn’t because he was convinced by the NRA, but rather because he grew increasingly concerned about the left’s radical opposition to private firearms (something I’ve noticed as well).

I gradually came around to see how extremely anti-gun, anti-Second Amendment the left was. For a large portion of them, their ultimate goal is a full gun ban and to repeal the Second Amendment — I know I was one of them.

And even though he no longer considers himself on the left, he doesn’t want his friends on that side of the debate to misinterpret his views.

To my easily confused friends on the left — no, I am not calling for violence; no, I am not a terrorist, no, I am not racist. Peace.

Since the author’s overall perspective has changed, I guess he doesn’t belong on my “honest leftists” page, but his shift on gun rights is nonetheless worth noting.

Hopefully he’s now sufficiently “woke” on guns that he would be part of the resistance if his former fellow travelers on the left ever tried a gun ban.

To close on a humorous note. Here’s the visual version of my IQ test on guns.

This next gem is basically the Twitter version of my column last month on the 2nd Amendment, addressing the fact that most advocates of gun control, if you press them on the issue, really do want to confiscate all guns and eviscerate part of the Bill of Rights.

Last but not least, we have an expanded version of the anti-rape image from above.

It’s been several weeks since the awful tragedy in Parkland, FL, where 17 students were killed by an evil loser. Since I written several times about the utter impracticality of gun control, and since a growing number of honest liberals (see here, here, here, and here) also acknowledge that such laws are ill-advised, I didn’t think another column would be necessary.

So I decided to take part in a four-person debate on the issue for France 24. Needless to say, I was the only pro-Second Amendment person on the show (it was 4-1 against me if you include the moderator). You can watch the entire 45 minutes by clicking here, but you can get a good idea of the one-sided nature by simply watching this excerpt from the introduction.

Here’s the first question I fielded, which gave me a chance to knock our unprincipled President.

But more importantly, I noted that gun control doesn’t succeed because ordinary Americans are very diligent about protecting their constitutional rights.

This next segment gave me an opportunity to make several points.

The silliness of banning “scary looking” rifles when there are hundreds of millions of other weapons that work the same way.

Democrats have rallied behind truly radical legislation targeting all semi-automatic weapons (knowing that non-gun people don’t know what that term means, I used “non-revolver” as a synonym, but I admit that probably isn’t any better).

Gun bans are especially absurd in a world with 3D printers.

Censorship would probably be effective in reducing mass shooters, but I don’t want to repeal the First Amendment.

Rising levels of gun ownership are correlated with lower levels of crime.

By the way, none of the other guests ever tried to refute any of my points. Check the full video if you doubt me.

And you’ll notice I took another shot at our unprincipled president. Our Constitution is not a pick-and-choose document.

So what’s the practical impact of all this?

Gun-control proposals generally fall into two categories. Some politicians go after the “military-style” weapons, which is empty posturing that will no (positive) impact on crime. I wrote about this issue in the past, and you can click here and here for added info on the failed 1994 ban.

Teachers could soon be carrying concealed guns inside schools in Pike County under a proposal that was preliminarily approved Monday evening by the Pike County School Board. The unanimous decision…was prompted by multiple school shootings in recent weeks… Schools Superintendent Reed Adkins said he hopes the board will give final approval within two to three weeks, and to have armed staff in schools by fall, if not sooner. …State Sen. John Schickel, R- Union, has introduced Senate Resolution 172 that would urge boards of education to allow teachers and other school personnel to carry firearms for their own protection. …Multiple mothers of Pike County students urged quick action Monday to provide schools with some type of security, saying their children have been scared to attend school.

One of the first school districts in the state of Colorado to implement such a policy was in eastern El Paso County… A decision made in hopes of preventing another school shooting here at home and more than a year later, most people are grateful this was put into place. “Our school’s pretty much a model for school safety,” Terry Siewiyumptewa, a parent said. …”Our staff members, it could be 100 percent, are armed and are here to protect and keep our students safe,” Dr. Grant Schmidt, Superintendent for Hanover School District 28 said. Now, teachers, administrators, custodians and even bus drivers can all volunteer to conceal carry in school… “We need safe schools and our school is providing us what we’ve asked for,” Siewiyumptewa said. …”The only way to stop a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun,” she said. …Students we spoke with say it has added an extra level of comfort. …Dr. Schmidt says he’s been getting calls from other school districts across the country all year, wanting to know how they put this into place, asking for guidance, research and other documents to use as a model.

…at Argyle High School, the..teachers are packing handguns. A sign outside campus warns: “Please be aware that the staff at Argyle [Independent School District] are armed and may use whatever force is necessary to protect our students.” …In about two dozen states, including California, schools can allow staff to carry guns on campus, although some require concealed-carry licenses, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. …Officials at Argyle and other districts say the policies deter shooters and provide peace of mind, and that other schools should follow their lead. Scores of Texas school districts allow teachers to carry arms. …”It’s essential to keep us safe,” said Lizzie Dagg, 18, Argyle senior class president, who spent part of lunch Thursday signing a banner expressing sympathy to Parkland students. …history teacher Sharon Romero…said. “I feel safer coming to work than a lot of other teachers in this country do.” …Argyle High Principal James Hill, who has three children in the school system, was skeptical about the policy when he was hired in 2015, but said, “Now I’m a believer.” …he said of school shootings. “… I want to give our kids a fighting chance.”

Here are two maps from the article, showing who is allowed to have guns in a school. Here’s the map for the general public.

One California school district has voted to allow staff members to carry guns on campus. The district says the policy was put in place to ensure the safety of students in case there is an active shooter situation. …Kingsburg High School District, near Fresno, is just the second district in the state to allow concealed weapons at school buildings.

For all the outcry, though, hundreds of school districts across the country, most of them small and rural, already have. Officials…do not see the weaponry scattered through their schools as a political statement, but as a practical response to a potent threat. …At least 10 states allow staff members to possess or have access to a firearm on school grounds, according to an analysis by the Education Commission of the States. And local districts have varied their approach to arming educators — in Ohio, guns are kept in safes; in Texas, they can be worn in holsters or kept in safes within immediate reach. …In Texas, some public school systems have been quietly arming teachers and administrators for more than a decade.

This part of the story is very powerful.

Sidney City Schools was shaken by the slaughter of 20 first graders and six staff members at Sandy Hook in 2012. In the following days, Sheriff Lenhart presented Mr. Scheu with an equation: Every 17 seconds after the first shots are fired and the first 911 call is made, somebody gets hurt or dies. “Even in the best-case scenario, we could get here in four to five minutes,” Sheriff Lenhart said. “You do the math.” …Sheriff Lenhart…led what he calls a “layered” approach to school security and a “conservative” approach to arming teachers in the 3,400-student school district. The district spent about $70,000 on safes, bulletproof vests, cameras, guns, radios and ammunition…negligible costs for a school district with a $36 million budget… there’s a secret group of 40 educators — teachers, principals, custodians, secretaries — called a “first responder team” that can retrieve firearms in under a minute.

Bureaucrats weren’t happy about this development, but guess who is pleased?

The measures here met some opposition at first, from the town’s teachers union and police chief, who were concerned about gun safety. …Nicki New, the parent of three students in Sidney City Schools, said she felt safer dropping off her children knowing there were staff members equipped to respond to a parent’s worst nightmare.

Does that guarantee safety? Nope. Is it possible a teacher might shoot an innocent person in the stress and chaos of an active-shooter situation? Yup. There are no sure-fire, cost-free solutions to this horrible problem. It’s all about the policies that will improve the odds of good outcomes and reduce the likelihood of bad outcomes.

But here’s my bottom line. If my kids were still young and some miserable excuse for a human being came into one of their schools and started shooting, there’s no question that I would want some of the teachers to be armed.

Moreover, ask yourself whether a nutjob shooter is more likely or less likely to target a school with armed teachers. Like other mass shooters, they almost universally wreak their havoc in so-called gun-free zones.

I’ll close with one final observation. Teacher unions are controlled by leftist ideologues and claim that it’s a bad idea to allow armed teachers. They’re wrong, but the really preposterous part of their argument is that teachers shouldn’t be forced to carry guns.

But nobody is suggesting that. Instead, it’s an option for teachers who are prefer fighting to cowering in a corner waiting to be shot.

And lots of teachers don’t like the latter option, as indicated by this story in the Washington Examiner.

A sheriff in Ohio has already started the process of training school personnel on how to carry a concealed weapon, and predicted on Friday that hundreds would soon be trained and ready. …”While our gov still debates what 2 do we will have trained over 100 school personnel by Saturday,” he added. …Sheriff Jones said his offer to train teachers has been met with an overwhelming response. On Tuesday, he said he cut off requests at 300.

Makes me proud of America’s teachers. Their union stinks, but three cheers for the rank and file.

P.S. Since I’m a fiscal wonk, I rarely get to publicly pontificate on gun rights. Here’s my only other interview on the topic.

And we also get lots of clever humor on the issue. Though I must confess that I’ve been negligent about collecting and sharing examples of anti-gun control humor in recent months. I did have an amusing comparison of how Texans and Europeans fight terrorism last month, but otherwise you have to go back to 2015 (see here, here, here, here, and here) and earlier.

So it’s time to atone for this oversight with some new humor targeting the pro-gun control crowd.

We’ll start with a visit to the University of Texas, which has been the scene of protests because a handful of students are upset that the law has been reformed to allow concealed carry on campus.

On January 16, 2002, a former student at Appalachian Law School walked into the office of the school’s dean and opened fire. His rampage ultimately took the lives of the dean, a professor, and a student. As the shots rang out, most bystanders ran for their lives, but not all. Three students approached the shooter. One, a Marine veteran, was unarmed. The other two had raced to their personal vehicles the instant they heard shots fired and returned with their dildos. Wait. No. That’s not what happened. Sorry. They returned with their guns. As two students held the shooter at gunpoint, the Marine tackled him, ending the threat. The cost was still high: Three people died, and three more lay wounded. But at the end of the day, a bad guy with a gun was stopped by good guys with guns. I thought of this story while reading the fawning media coverage of Texas students protesting a new state law permitting license-holders to carry concealed firearms on campus. Students are out in force, waving . . . sex toys. The inevitable hashtag? #CocksNotGlocks.

Yes, you read correctly.

The protesting students think that brandishing dildos will somehow persuade the general population that law-abiding students should be denied the right to bear arms.

Mr. French points out the silliness of their anti-gun position.

…if University of Texas protesters, teachers, and officials believe that until classes started yesterday UT was, in fact, a gun-free campus, they’ve lost their minds. Before this new law, there were two types of people who had guns on campus: criminals and the handful of law-enforcement officers scattered across a vast university. Every single other responsible, law-abiding citizen was disarmed — utterly dependent on officers who could be minutes away. …if one a person thinks that a licensed concealed-carry holder makes the UT’s campus more dangerous, they’ve lost their minds. Let’s make this concrete. Imagine you’re teaching a class, and you know that Amy, a student in the front row, has a concealed-carry permit. Sitting next to her is Roxanne, who does not. You have no idea if either one of them is actually armed. Who’s more likely to shoot the teacher? Roxanne, and it’s not even close. Who’s more likely to save your life? Amy, and it’s not even close. …If you are in a classroom, and a criminal opens fire, would you rather have a dildo on your desk or a revolver in your backpack?

Gee, that’s a tough question. Maybe a really skilled student could use a dildo like a Jedi light saber and deflect bullets, right?

By the way, if you’re wondering why Mr. French is so bold in his claim that Amy is likely to save lives with her concealed-carry weapon, that’s because John Lott of the Crime Prevention Research Center has crunched the numbers and determined that people with concealed-carry permits are about the most law-abiding group of people in the nation.

Concealed-carry permit holders are nearly the most law-abiding demographic of Americans, a new report by the Crime Prevention Research Center says… “Indeed, it is impossible to think of any other group in the U.S. that is anywhere near as law-abiding,” says the report, titled “Concealed Carry Permit Holders Across the United States 2016.”

So what group in the nation is better about obeying the law?

The article doesn’t say, though my guess is nuns.

If you guessed police officers, you’d be wrong.

The study compared permit holders to police, who committed 703 crimes from 2005 to 2007, and 113 of those were firearm violations. “With about 685,464 full-time police officers in the U.S. from 2005 to 2007, we find that there were about 103 crimes per hundred thousand officers,” the report reads. “For the U.S. population as a whole, the crime rate was 37 times higher—3,813 per hundred thousand people.” …“We find that permit holders are convicted of misdemeanors and felonies at less than a sixth the rate for police officers,” the report says. “Among police, firearms violations occur at a rate of 16.5 per 100,000 officers. Among permit holders in Florida and Texas, the rate is only 2.4 per 100,000.10. That is just one-seventh of the rate for police officers.”

In other words, the folks in Texas (like the hypothetical Amy in David French’s article) are statistically the one most likely to obey the law and protect against crime.

So the protesters at the University of Texas should be thankful the law has been changed and their campus is no longer a “gun-free zone,” which means that only law-abiding people are disarmed.

Rather than carrying dildos as a form of protest, they should therefore use their sex toys for other purposes (particularly if they have Pajama Boy-type partners).